🦋🤖 Robo-Spun by IBF 🦋🤖

(All parts in English)

Ella Sharpe Dream (1)

Since we have discussed desire extensively in recent sessions, we will now begin to tackle the question of interpretation. The graph should serve us for something. What I will discuss with you today, using an example—namely, the interpretation of a dream—I wish to introduce with some remarks derived from the insights FREUD provides specifically on dream interpretation.

Here is essentially the sense of FREUD’s remark that I am targeting, found in a chapter where he focuses on the intellectual feeling about dreams. For example, when the subject recounts a dream, they have the impression that something is missing, something they have forgotten, or that something is ambiguous, doubtful, or uncertain.

In all these cases, FREUD tells us, what the subject indicates about the dream—concerning its uncertainty, its doubt, its ambiguity, namely: “It’s either this or that…”, “I can’t remember…”, “I can’t say anymore…”, even regarding its degree of reality, i.e., the degree of reality with which it was experienced, whether it was something so vividly affirmed in the dream that the subject takes note of it, or conversely, whether it was an [abstract] dream—all this, FREUD says, in all such cases, must be considered as stating what FREUD calls “one of the latent thoughts of the dream.”

What the subject essentially expresses in marginal notes regarding the dream’s text—namely all the tonal accents, what in music would be accompanied by annotations such as allegro, crescendo, decrescendo—all this forms part of the dream’s text.

I do not believe that, for most of you, whom I assume are already familiar with the Traumdeutung and its technique, this is new. This is something truly fundamental for dream interpretation. I am merely recalling it here as I do not have the time to provide examples from FREUD, and I refer you to the Traumdeutung. You will see how FREUD uses this essential reminder. He interprets the dream by integrating the feeling of doubt, for instance, present in the dream as the subject recounts it, as one of the dream’s elements, without which the dream could not be interpreted.

Thus, we start from FREUD’s interpretation and ask ourselves what implications this carries. It is not enough to accept this fact or rule of conduct as something to be religiously followed, as many of FREUD’s disciples have done, without seeking to delve deeper, placing blind trust in the unconscious, so to speak. What does it imply when FREUD tells us that it is not just the tension of your unconscious at play when your recollection of the dream falters or, on the contrary, falls under a certain category or accent? He says: “This is part of the latent thoughts of the dream itself.”

It is here, then, that what we agree to call the graph enables us to clarify and articulate more clearly, more certainly, what is at stake when FREUD gives us such a rule of conduct for dream interpretation.

Here is what we can say. What do we do when we communicate a dream, whether within or outside analysis? The practice of providing a formula for recounting a dream, distinguishing it among all possible enunciations by a specific structure relative to the subject, predates analysis.

Within a discourse, in the statements we deliver as event-related, we can legitimately distinguish the following: among these statements concerning events, there are those particularly worthy of distinction concerning the register of the signifier:

• They are statements we can categorize under the general rubric of indirect discourse.
• They are statements concerning the enunciations of other subjects.
• They are the articulation of someone else’s signifying chains.

And many things are introduced this way, including other statements, that is to say, hearsay:

• “I was told that…”
• “So-and-so confirmed that this happened…”
• “Such-and-such a person…”

This is the form, or one of the most fundamental forms, of universal discourse, encompassing most of the things we ourselves must account for, derived from the traditions of others.

Thus, we can say there is a relationship of pure and simple factual statement, which we take responsibility for, and on the other hand, something latent, involving the dimension of enunciation, which is not necessarily made explicit but becomes evident when it pertains to recounting someone else’s statement.

This could equally concern our own discourse. We might say we said something, that we testified before someone, and we can even acknowledge that the statement we made was entirely false. We can testify that we lied. One such possibility is what currently holds our attention. What are we doing when enunciating a dream?

We are doing something not unique to its class, at least in the way we will now define it. It is noteworthy that this is the spontaneous approach to dreams before entering into the “quarrel of the sages,” that is to say, the notion that “the dream has no meaning; it is a product of the decomposition of psychic activity,” a so-called “scientific” stance upheld during a relatively short period in history.

FREUD himself remarked that he was merely returning to tradition.

It is already quite significant, what we have just advanced—that is, the tradition has never failed to pose, at least concerning the dream, a question about its meaning. In other words, what we articulate in producing the statement of a dream is something to which is attributed… in the very form in which we produce it from the moment we recount our dream to someone else… this question mark that is not just any question mark, but one that assumes there is something beneath the dream, of which the dream is the signifier.

I mean to say, we can write this in our formalization, that it involves an enunciation, a statement that itself carries an index of enunciation, which itself is supposed to take on value—of course, not a factual or event-based value. We must add an additional accent to recount this in a purely descriptive way.

The attitude that remains spontaneous, the traditional attitude, is so ambiguous in the small child who begins to tell you their dreams, saying: “Last night, I dreamed…” If one observes closely, everything happens as if, at some point, the child discovered the possibility they have of expressing such things, to the extent that, very often, one cannot truly know… at the age when this confidential activity of the child about their dreams begins… whether, after all, what they are telling you is indeed something they dreamed or something they are bringing to you because they know that dreams exist and can be recounted.

These dreams of the child have this quality of being on the border of fabrication, as contact with a child makes apparent. But precisely, if the child produces and recounts it in this way, it is imbued with the quality of that little “e,” the index of enunciation: E(e).

Something lies beyond. Through this, precisely, the child plays with you the game of a question, a fascination. And to sum it up, the formula for any type of relationship concerning the dream, whether intra- or extra-analytic, is this: E(e), which we shall call the general formula of something that is, therefore, not unique to the dream, but is that of the enigma.

From there, what does FREUD mean? Let us examine it with our small graph, which is presented as follows for the occasion. If we suppose that the production of the dream… to see how we will use this graph to project the different elements of this formalization. There may be several ways.

The structural interest of the graph lies in its ability to represent the relationship between the subject and the signifier… insofar as necessarily, once the subject is caught up in the signifier—and it is essential that they are caught up in it, as this is what defines them, the relationship of the individual with the signifier… a structure—and a network—then necessarily imposes itself, one that remains, in a way, always fundamental.

Let us endeavor here to see how we can distribute the various functions involved in the enunciation of the dream within the graph in this case. What is at stake, the pivotal point, is the total statement, I would say—the dream as a spontaneous creation, presented as something that, in its initial aspect, has a relatively total character, as a specific block. We say, “I had a dream,” distinguishing it from another dream that followed, which is not the same.

It bears the quality of this discourse, reflecting itself insofar as, at the moment we recount it, nothing reveals the fragmentation, the decomposition of the signifier, about which we have all sorts of retroactive evidence indicating that this fragmentation is incidental to the function of all discourse. But discourse, insofar as the subject adheres to it, constantly suspends our choice at each moment of advancing a discourse; without this, our way of communicating would become significantly more arduous.

This dream is given to us as a whole. It is this statement that occurs, if I may say so, at the lower level of the graph. It is a chain of signifiers presented in a form that is all the more global because it is closed, because it appears in the habitual form of language. It is something about which the subject must make a report, an enunciation, positioning themselves in relation to it, presenting it to you with all its nuances, and imbuing it with a degree of adherence—greater or lesser—to what they are recounting to you.

That is to say, in essence, it is at the level of discourse for the other, which is also the discourse in which the subject assumes this dream, that something occurs, something that accompanies the dream and comments on it in some way from the subject’s more or less assumed position. This means that here, during the recounting of what happened, the subject already situates themselves within it as the enunciation of the dream. It is here, in the discourse where the subject assumes it for you, the person to whom they are recounting it, that we will observe these various elements emerging—these different accentuations that are always accentuations of the subject’s more or less assumption:

• “It seems to me, it appeared to me that this happened at that moment.”
• “At that moment, everything happened as if one subject was simultaneously another or was transforming into another.”

This is what I earlier referred to as its nuances. These various modes of assuming the experience of the dream by the subject are located here along the line of the “I” of enunciation, insofar as the subject assumes or does not assume it in their enunciation regarding this psychic event. What does this mean, if not that what we have here is precisely what in our graph is represented by the fragmented, discontinuous line, which indicates to you the characteristic of what articulates itself at the level of enunciation insofar as this concerns the signifier.

Consider the following:

• If it is true that what justifies the lower line, the one on which, on every occasion, we have placed this retroaction of the code upon the message, which at every moment gives the sentence its meaning,
• this phrastic unity has varying scopes: at the end of a long discourse, at the end of my seminar, or at the end of my seminars, there is something that retroactively loops the meaning of what I had previously articulated,
• yet to some degree, within each part of my discourse, within each paragraph, something is formed.

The question is to determine the smallest degree at which we must stop to observe this effect we call the effect of meaning, insofar as it constitutes something essentially new, going beyond what is referred to as the usages of the signifier. This constitutes a sentence, this creation of meaning formed in language.

Where does this stop? It obviously stops at the smallest unit, which is the sentence, precisely that unit which, on this occasion, appears here quite clearly in the relation of the dream, in the form of whether the subject assumes or does not assume it, believes or does not believe it, recounts something, or doubts what they are telling us.

What I mean to say in this context is that this line, or loop of enunciation, operates on sentence fragments that can be shorter than the totality of what is recounted.

The dream, concerning a particular part of the dream, provides you with an assumption by the subject, an enunciative stance of a scope shorter than the whole of the dream. In other words, it introduces the possibility of fragmentation, of much shorter scope at the upper level than at the lower level. This puts us on the path to what FREUD implies when he says that this accent of assumption by the subject is part of the latent thoughts of the dream.

This tells us that it is at the level of enunciation and insofar as it involves this form of highlighting the signifier that is implicated by free association. That is to say, if the chain of signifiers has two aspects:

• The first is the unity of its meaning, the phrastic significance, the monolithism of the sentence, the holophrastic quality—or more precisely, the fact that a sentence can be taken as having a unique meaning, as something forming a “transitory” signifier, yet one that, for the duration of its existence, holds by itself as such,
• and the other aspect of the signifier, which we call free association, entails that for each of the elements in this sentence—and as far as one can go in its decomposition, stopping strictly at the phonetic element—something may intervene that, by displacing one of these signifiers, implants in its place another signifier that supplants it.

And it is within this dynamic that the property of the signifier resides—it is something that relates to this aspect of the subject’s will. Something incidental intersects it at every moment, implying—without the subject knowing it and in a manner unconscious to them—that within this very discourse, directed beyond their intention, something in the choice of these elements intervenes, the effects of which we see emerging at the surface in forms such as the most elementary example of the phonematic slip. Whether it is a syllable altered in a word, it reveals the presence of another chain of signifiers that may intersect with the first and implant another meaning.

This is pointed out to us by FREUD: at the level of enunciation, therefore at the apparently most elaborate level of the subject’s assumption, at the point where the “I” positions itself as conscious in relation to—not “its own production,” since precisely the enigma remains intact—whose statement is this that we are discussing?

The subject does not resolve this. If they say, “I dreamed,” it carries a particular connotation and emphasis, such that the one who dreamed remains something that, in relation to the subject, appears as problematic. The subject of this enunciation, contained within the statement in question and with a question mark, was for a long time considered to be “God” before becoming the “self” of the subject (approximately since ARISTOTLE).

Returning to this “beyond the subject” that is the Freudian unconscious, an entire oscillation, an entire vacillation occurs, leaving it no less in a permanent question of its otherness. And what the subject subsequently reclaims from this is of the same fragmentary nature, holding the same value as a signifying element as that which occurs in the spontaneous phenomenon of substitution, of disruption of the signifier, which FREUD shows us elsewhere to be the normal path for deciphering the meaning of the dream.

In other words, the fragmentation that occurs at the level of enunciation—inasmuch as enunciation is the subject’s assumption of the dream—is something FREUD tells us is on the same level and of the same nature as what the rest of the doctrine shows us to be the path of dream interpretation, namely, the maximal decomposition of signifiers, the spelling out of signifying elements, insofar as it is in this spelling out that the potentialities of the dream are revealed.

That is to say, those intersections, those intervals it leaves, which only appear insofar as the chain of signifiers is brought into relation, intersected, and intertwined with all the other chains that, regarding each element of the dream, can intersect and intertwine with the first. In other words, it is insofar—and in a more exemplary way regarding the dream than with any other discourse—that:

• in the discourse of the subject, in the actual discourse, we destabilize, we allow to detach from the current meaning what is involved as a signifier in this enunciation,
• it is along this path that we approach what, in the Freudian doctrine, is called the “unconscious.”

It is to the extent that the signifier is implicated, in the possibilities of rupture, in the points of rupture of this unconscious, that lies the trace we pursue, what we are here to uncover, namely, what essential event occurred in the subject that keeps certain signifiers in repression.

And this something will allow us to move precisely toward the path of the subject’s desire, that is, toward that aspect of the subject which, caught within the network of signifiers, is maintained and must, so to speak—for its revelation—pass through these meshes, is subjected to this filtering, to this sieving of the signifier, and is what we aim to recover and restore within the subject’s discourse.

How can we do this? What does it mean that we are able to do it?
As I have told you, desire is essentially linked—through doctrine, practice, and Freudian experience—to this position: it is excluded, enigmatic, or posited in relation to the subject as being essentially tied to the existence of the signifier, repressed as such, and its restitution or restoration is tied to the return of these signifiers.

But this does not mean that the restitution of these signifiers purely and simply articulates desire:

• One thing is what is articulated in these repressed signifiers, which is always a demand.
• Another thing is desire, insofar as desire is something by which the subject situates themselves—by virtue of the existence of discourse—in relation to that demand.

It is not about what the subject asks for; it is about what the subject is in relation to that demand and what the subject is, to the extent that the demand is repressed, is masked. This is what is expressed in a closed-off way in the fantasy of their desire. It is their relation to a being that would not even be in question were it not for the demand, for discourse—which is fundamentally language—but which begins to come into question from the moment language introduces this dimension of being and simultaneously takes it away.

The restitution of the meaning of the fantasy—that is to say, of something imaginary—emerges between two lines:

• Between the articulation of the subject’s intention,
• and that something which, in a fragmented manner, they connect to this intention—an intention profoundly splintered, fragmented, refracted by language.

Between the two lies this fantasy, $◊a, where the subject typically suspends their relation to being. But this fantasy is always enigmatic, more so than anything else. And what does the subject want? This: for us to interpret it! To interpret desire is to restore that which the subject cannot access on their own, namely, the affect that signifies, at the level of their desire—which is their own desire.
I am speaking of the precise desire involved in a particular incident in the subject’s life: the masochistic desire, the suicidal desire, the sacrificial desire on occasion.

What is at stake is for this, which occurs in such a closed form for the subject, to reclaim its place, its meaning in relation to the masked discourse implicated in this desire, to reclaim its meaning in relation to being, to confront the subject with being, to reclaim its true meaning. This is what, for example, I would define as “positional affects in relation to being.”

This is what we call love, hatred, or ignorance, essentially, and many other terms besides, for which we must compile a comprehensive overview and catalog.

To the extent that what we call “affect” is not something purely and simply opaque and closed off—
something like an otherworldly entity, a kind of core experience falling from the heavens without any understanding of its origin—but instead, to the extent that affect is very precisely and always something connoted by a certain position of the subject in relation to being. By this, I mean in relation to being insofar as:

• what is proposed to the subject in its fundamental dimension is symbolic,
• or, on the contrary, within the symbolic, it represents an irruption of the real—this time profoundly disruptive.

And it is very difficult not to realize that a fundamental affect, like anger, is nothing other than this: the real arriving at the moment when we have constructed a very fine symbolic framework, where everything is going well—order, law, our merit, and our good intentions. Suddenly, it becomes apparent that the pegs don’t fit into the holes!

This is the origin of the affect of anger: everything is proceeding smoothly for “the bridge of boats over the Bosphorus,” but then a storm arises, causing the sea to rage. Every expression of anger is about making the sea rage!

And furthermore, this is something that relates to the intrusion of desire itself and is also something that determines a form of affect, which we will revisit. But affect is essentially—and as such… at least for an entire fundamental category of affects—a characteristic connotation of the subject’s position, a position that is situated, if we consider the essential possible positions, within this dynamic engagement, this process, this implementation of the subject in relation to the necessary lines imposed by their envelopment in the signifier.

Now, let us examine an example. This example, I have taken from the legacy of FREUD. It allows us to clearly articulate what the [dream in?] analysis represents. And to proceed in a way that avoids any overly arbitrary choice, I have taken Chapter V of Dream Analysis by Ella SHARPE, where the author uses the analysis of a simple dream as an example—I mean a dream she considers simple while carrying the analysis as far as possible to its conclusion.

You understand that, in the preceding chapters, she presented a number of perspectives, rules, and mechanisms, such as the incidence of dreams in analytic practice or even, beyond this, the problems posed by the analysis of dreams or the dynamics within the dreams of analyzed individuals. The pivot point of this book is precisely the chapter in which she provides us with a singular example of an exemplary dream. In this, she brings into play, into operation, and illustrates everything else she might have to show us about how analytic practice demonstrates that we must effectively be guided in the analysis of a dream.

Specifically, this essential point that the practitioner contributes as something new after the Traumdeutung: that a dream is not simply something revealed to have significance—that is the Traumdeutung—but something that, within analytic communication, within the analytic dialogue, actively and deliberately plays a role. It does not arise at just any moment in analysis, but at particular moments, and precisely, the dream emerges in an active, determined way to accompany analytic discourse, to illuminate it, to extend its pathways. The dream, ultimately, becomes something created not only for the analysis but often for the analyst.

Within analysis, the dream is essentially a bearer of a message.
The author in question does not hold back on this point, nor do the authors who have since addressed the analysis of dreams.

The only question is what interpretation, what emphasis we assign to it. And, as you know, I have drawn attention to this in my report at Royaumont. This is not a minor issue concerning thought in relation to the dream. Some authors believe they can dismiss it, as they see in it something akin to an activity. At the very least, it is undoubtedly something.

What I mean is that the fact that the dream presents itself as material for discourse, as material for discursive elaboration, is something we must consider. If we fail to see that the unconscious is not elsewhere but in the latencies—not in some nebulous psychic repository where it would remain unstructured, but rather, as unconscious, either beneath or (this is another question) immanent to the subject’s formulation, to their discourse, to their enunciation of themselves—we will see how legitimate it is to consider the dream, as it has always been regarded, as the royal road to the unconscious.

This is how the situation unfolds in the dream presented by the author. I will begin by reading the dream itself. I will show how the problems arise in its regard. She first gives us a brief preface about the subject, which we will need to carefully consider. Indeed, the entire chapter will need to be reviewed and critiqued to allow us to grasp how what she articulates is, simultaneously—better than in any other domain—applicable to our own guiding frameworks and, at the same time, how these frameworks might enable us to orient ourselves better.

The patient arrives at their session that day under certain conditions, which I will recall shortly. It is only after certain associations—which you will see are extremely important—that they remember: “This reminds me of…”
I will return to these natural associations.

“I don’t know why, but I have just thought,” he says, “of my dream last night. It was a tremendous dream. I must have dreamt for ages…//… I won’t bore you with it all for the simple reason that I cannot remember it. But it was a very exciting dream, full of incidents, full of interest. I woke up hot and sweating.”

He says he cannot recall that vast dream, that sea of dreams, but what comes to mind is this: a rather short scene, which he then recounts.

“I dreamt that I was taking a journey with my wife…”

There is here a subtle nuance, perhaps not sufficiently emphasized, regarding the typical order of complements in the English language. I don’t think I am mistaken in saying that: “I had undertaken a journey with my wife around the world…” is something noteworthy. There is a difference between “a journey around the world with my wife,” which would seem to be the normal French order for circumstantial complements, and “I undertook a journey with my wife around the world.” I believe that here, the sensitivity of the English ear is similar.

“…we arrived in Czechoslovakia, where all sorts of things happened. I met a woman on a road, a road that now reminds me of the road I described to you in two other dreams recently, in which I was having sexual play with a woman in front of another woman.”

At this point, the author rightly changes the typography, as it introduces a lateral reflection:

“So it happened in this dream.”

“This time,” he resumes the recounting of the dream, “my wife was present while the sexual event took place. The woman I met was very passionate-looking.”

And here again, the typography changes appropriately because it is already a comment, an association:

“And this reminded me of a woman I saw the day before in a restaurant. She was dark, with very full lips, very red, and very passionate-looking—using the same expression, the same passionate appearance—and it was obvious that if I had given her the slightest encouragement, she would have responded. She may well have stimulated this dream.”

“In the dream, the woman wanted to have intercourse with me, and she took the initiative, which, as you know, is something that helps me greatly,” he comments. “If the woman is willing to do that, I am greatly helped.”

“In the dream, the woman was actually on top of me. That has just now come to my mind. She was clearly intending to insert my penis into her body. I could tell by her movements. I disagreed, but she was so disappointed that I thought I should masturbate her.”

Here, commentary resumes:

“It sounds completely wrong to use that verb in a transitive way. One should say ‘I masturbated,’ meaning ‘I masturbated myself.'”

The peculiarity of the English verb is that it does not have the reflexive form it does in French. When one says “I masturbate” in English, it means “I masturbate myself.”

“…that is entirely correct, but it is quite incorrect,” he remarks, “to use the word transitively.”

The analyst does not fail to react to this remark from the subject, and regarding this, the subject indeed makes some confirming observations. He begins to associate this with his own masturbations. However, that is not where it ends.

Here is the statement of this dream. It should initiate interest in what we are about to discuss. I must say, it is, in a way, a rather arbitrary method of presentation—I could do without it. Nor should you believe that this is the systematic approach I would recommend for interpreting a dream. It is simply a way of laying a marker to illustrate what we aim to explore and demonstrate.

Just as in the dream from FREUD—taken from FREUD, the death dream we discussed—we were able to identify, in a manner you could see was not without artifice, the signifiers of “he is dead… according to his wish,” which his son wished for him, so here, in a similar way, we will see the point where the fantasy of the dream effectively culminates, namely:

“I disagreed, but she was so disappointed that I thought I should masturbate her.”

With the observation, made immediately by the subject, that “it is quite incorrect to use this verb transitively.”
The entire analysis of the dream will demonstrate that it is indeed through restoring this intransitivity of the verb that we uncover the true meaning of the matter at hand.

She was “very disappointed…”—about what? It seems that the entire text of the dream indicates this sufficiently: namely, that our subject is hardly participating, despite indicating that everything in the dream is designed to encourage him to do so, given that he would normally be greatly assisted in such a position.

Without a doubt, this is what is at stake, and we might say that the second part of the sentence fits well with what FREUD articulates as one of the characteristics of dream formation, namely, secondary elaboration: that it presents itself as having comprehensible content.

Nevertheless, the subject himself points out that this does not go smoothly, since even the verb he uses is something he indicates does not seem to sound right to him. According to the very application of FREUD’s formula, we must take note of this observation by the subject as pointing us toward the trace of what the dream’s thought is. And that is desire.

By telling us that “I thought…” must be followed by something that restores the phrase in the following form:
“I thought she could masturbate,” which is the normal form in which the wish would present itself:
“Let her masturbate if she’s not happy!”—the subject here energetically indicates that masturbation concerns an activity that is not transitive in the sense of passing from the subject to another but, as he expresses it, intransitive.

This means, in this case, an activity of the subject on themselves. He underscores it clearly:

“When one says, ‘I masturbated,’ it means, ‘I masturbated myself.’”

This is an expository method because the point, of course, is not to settle this issue—although, I repeat, it is important to realize that here, already and immediately, the first indication provided by the subject is a cue for the rectification of the signifying articulation.

What does this rectification allow us? It is approximately this: everything we are now going to examine begins, first of all, with the introduction of this scene, of this session. The author provides it through a description that is not necessarily a general account of the subject’s behavior. Indeed, she even offers us a small preamble concerning his psychic constellation.

In short, we will need to return to this because what she has placed in these premises will reappear in her conclusions, and we will need to critique those conclusions. To move directly to the essential point—I mean, to what will allow us to proceed—we will note that she observes that this subject is evidently very gifted, and his behavior… will become clearer and clearer as we focus on the matter.

He is a man of a certain age, already married, who works professionally as a barrister.
And she tells us—this is worth noting in the exact terms used by the subject—that:

“As soon as the subject began his professional activity, he developed severe phobias. Put briefly…

this is where the description of the phobia mechanism is limited…

…this means…

she says—and we place great trust in her because she is one of the finest analysts, one of the most intuitive and penetrating to have existed…

…not that he dare not work successfully, but that he must stop working in reality because he would be only too successful.”

[“When the time came for him to practise at the bar he developed severe phobias. Put briefly, this meant not that he dare not work successfully but that he must stop working in reality because he would be only too successful.” p.127.]

The note made by the analyst here, that this is not about an affinity for failure but rather that the subject stops, so to speak, before the immediate possibility of highlighting his abilities, is something worth retaining. You will see how we will make use of this observation later.

Let us set aside what the analyst indicates from the outset as being something that might relate to the father. We will return to it. Let us simply note that the father died when the subject was three years old and that for a very long time, the subject made no other mention of this father except to say, specifically, that he was dead.

What rightfully draws the analyst’s attention is the fact that—as is quite evident—the subject does not want to remember that his father ever lived. This does not seem to be something that can be contested. And “when he remembers his father’s life,” she says, “it is certainly a startling event,” one that frightens him, producing in him a kind of terror.

[“It was a startling moment when one day he thought that his father had also lived…” (p. 126)]

Soon enough, the subject’s position in the analysis will suggest that the death wish the subject may have harbored toward his father lies at the root of this forgetting and of the entire articulation of his desire, insofar as the dream reveals it. However, let us be clear: nothing, as you will see, indicates in any way an aggressive intention originating from a fear of retaliation. It is precisely this point that a careful study of the dream will allow us to clarify. Indeed, what does the analyst tell us about this subject? She says:

“On that day, as on other days, I didn’t hear him coming.”
[“On the day …//… I did not hear him coming upstairs. I never do.”]

Here, there is a brief, very sharp paragraph regarding the nonverbal presentation of the subject, corresponding to a certain fashion in analytic observation. That is, all these minor incidents of his behavior that an attentive analyst knows how to spot: “That one,” she says, “I never hear him arrive.” It is understood in the context that one enters her office by climbing a staircase:

“There are those who climb two steps at a time, and those, I recognize by a ‘thud, thud…’”
[“One patient comes up two stairs at a time and I hear just the extra thud…” (p.129)]

The English word thud has no exact equivalent. In English, it refers to a dull, muffled sound, the sound made by a footfall on a carpeted step, which becomes slightly louder when climbing two steps at once.

“…another hurries.”
[“…another hurries.”]

The entire chapter is filled with such observations, and it is quite charmingly written. However, this is purely a digression because the important thing is what the patient does. The patient maintains an attitude of perfect, slightly formal correctness:

“…which never changes. He always approaches the couch in the same way. He always gives a perfectly conventional greeting with the same smile, a completely pleasant smile—not forced and not overtly concealing hostile intentions.”
[“He never varies. He always gets on the couch one way. He always gives a conventional greeting with the same smile, a pleasant smile, not forced or manifestly covering hostile impulses.” (p.130)]

Here, the analyst’s tact is well-directed:

“There is nothing that could reveal that such a thing could exist. […] nothing is left to chance; his clothes are perfectly neat; […] not a hair is out of place; […] he settles himself, folds his hands, and is perfectly calm…”
[“There is never anything as revealing as that would be. […] nothing haphazard, no clothes awry; […] no hair out of place. […] He lies down and makes himself easy.” (p.130)]

And there is never any kind of immediate, disruptive event, such as his housekeeper having played some trick on him before he left or having made him late. We only learn of such things after a long delay, perhaps at the very end of the session, or even the following session.

“What he narrates during the entire hour, he does so clearly, with excellent diction, without any hesitation, with many pauses. In a distinct and perfectly even voice, he expresses all his thoughts and never—she adds—what he feels.”
[“He talks the whole hour, clearly, fluently, in good diction, without hesitation and with many pauses. He speaks in a distinct and even voice, for it expresses thinking and never feeling.” (p.130)]

What should we make of a distinction between thought and feeling? Of course, we would all agree with such a presentation, but the important thing is obviously to understand what this particular mode of communication signifies. Any analyst would think that the subject fears something here—a sort of sterilization of the text of the session—something that might make the analyst wish for the session to contain something more lived. But naturally, the fact that the subject expresses himself in this way must also have meaning. The absence of feelings, as expressed, is still not something to be dismissed entirely under the sentimental rubric.

Earlier, I spoke of affect as concerning the subject’s relation to being and as revealing it. We must ask ourselves what, in this instance, might communicate through such a channel. It is all the more appropriate to consider this, as this is precisely where the session opens that day.

The discrepancy between the way the analyst approaches this problem of something […] passing before her and the manner—which she herself notes—by which it surprises her clearly shows what additional step must be taken beyond the ordinary position of the analyst to appreciate what is specific to this case.

For what begins to unfold here will, as we proceed, unfold more and more until the final intervention of the analyst and its astonishing outcome. For it is astonishing not only that it happened but that it was recorded as an exemplary interpretation, notable for its fruitful and satisfying character.

That day, the analyst is struck by this: in the midst of this tableau—marked by the subject’s strict self-discipline, his rectitude with himself—something happens that she has never heard before. He arrives at her door and, just before entering, he makes a “hum, hum!” It is not much—merely the faintest of coughs. She was a remarkably sharp woman; everything in her style indicates this. Before becoming an analyst, she was something of an educator, an excellent starting point for penetrating psychological facts. Undoubtedly, she was a woman of exceptional talent.

She interprets this “little cough” as the dove returning to Noah’s Ark. It is a harbinger; this cough signals that somewhere, behind it, there is a place where feelings reside.

“Oh, but I will never speak to him about this, because if I mention it, he will clam up completely!”
(I made no reference to it, hoping it might get louder.)

This is the classic position in such cases: never remark to a patient, at a certain stage in their analysis—when it is crucial to observe them approaching—on their physical behavior, such as how they cough, lie down, button or unbutton their jacket, or anything involving reflexive motor habits that pertain to their self-image and might have a signaling value, particularly if it touches deeply on the narcissistic register.

This is where the power and symbolic dimension of the vocal register become distinct, extending across everything within it.

The same rule does not apply to something like a “little cough,” because a cough, regardless of its nature and irrespective of whether it seems purely somatic, falls within the same dimension as those “hum, hum…” or “yeah, yeah…” sounds some analysts decisively use to significant effect, serving as a prompt. The proof? To her great surprise, it is the very first thing the subject mentions to her. He says, in his usual, steady, but very deliberate voice:

“I have been thinking about that little cough I gave just before I entered the room. The last few days, I have coughed, and I have noticed it. I wonder if you have noticed it too. Today, when the maid downstairs called me up, I resolved not to cough. To my annoyance, however, I realized I coughed just as I finished climbing the stairs. It’s so annoying to have such a thing happen—annoying, all the more so, because it happens in you or through you, seemingly by yourself.”

(I have been considering that little cough that I give just before I enter the room. The last few days, I have coughed, I have become aware of it. I don’t know whether you have. Today, when the maid called me to come upstairs, I made up my mind I would not cough. To my annoyance, however, I realized I had coughed just as I had finished. It is most annoying to do a thing like that, most annoying that something goes on in you or by you that you cannot control, or do not control. [p. 131])

Listen carefully to what you cannot control and what you do not control.

“One wonders what the purpose of such a thing is. One wonders why it might happen at all. What purpose could possibly be served by a little cough like that?”

(One would think some purpose is served by it, but what possible purpose can be served by a little cough of that description is hard to think.)

The analyst proceeds with “the caution of a serpent” and prompts:
– “But yes, what purpose could it serve?”
– “Obviously,” he says, “it’s the kind of thing one might do if entering a room where there were lovers.”

[(Analyst.) What purpose could be served?
(Patient.) Well, it is the kind of thing that one would do if one were going into a room where two lovers were together.]

He recounts that he did something similar in his childhood, just before entering a room where his brother was with his girlfriend. He coughed before entering because he thought they might be kissing, and it would be better for them to stop beforehand. This way, they would feel less embarrassed than if he had caught them in the act.

The analyst prompts further:
– “Why cough before entering here?”
– “Yes, it’s a bit absurd,” he says, “because naturally, I can’t wonder if someone is here, since if I was told downstairs to come up, it means no one else is here. […] There’s no reason at all that I can see for this little cough. And it reminds me of a fantasy I had as a child. It was a fantasy about being in a room where I wasn’t supposed to be, thinking someone might come in, thinking I was there. And then I thought that to prevent anyone from entering and finding me there, I could bark like a dog. That would disguise my presence, because whoever came in would think, ‘Oh, it’s just a dog in there.’”

[(Analyst.) And why cough before coming in here?
(Patient.) That is absurd, because naturally I should not be asked to come up if someone were here, and I do not think of you in that way at all. There is no need for a cough at all that I can see. It has, however, reminded me of a fantasy I had of being in a room where I ought not to be, and thinking someone might think I was there, and then I thought to prevent anyone from coming in and finding me there I would bark like a dog. That would disguise my presence. The ‘someone’ would then say, ‘Oh, it’s only a dog in there.’ (p.132)]

“A dog?” the analyst cautiously prompts.
“That reminds me,” the patient continues easily enough, “of a dog that came and rubbed itself against my leg—really, it was masturbating itself. I was ashamed to tell you because I didn’t stop it. I let it continue, and someone might have come in.”

[(Analyst.) A dog?
(Patient.) That reminds me of a dog rubbing himself against my leg, really masturbating himself. I’m ashamed to tell you because I did not stop him. I let him go on, and someone might have come in. (pp. 131-132)]

At this point, he coughs lightly, and from there, he transitions into recounting his dream.

We will return to this in detail next time, but already, can we not see that here, even the recollection of the dream comes immediately after a message which, in all likelihood—and the author, of course, has no doubt about this and incorporates it into the dream analysis, placing it at the forefront—this “little cough” was a message. But the question is, a message about what?

On the other hand, as the subject himself brought it up—meaning, as he introduced the dream—it was a second-level message. That is to say, in the most formal sense, not unconscious: a message, because the subject did not simply say he coughed.

Even if he had only said, “I coughed,” it would still have been a message. But beyond this, he said, “I coughed, and it means something,” and immediately afterward, he begins recounting stories that are uniquely suggestive.

This obviously means: “I am here. If you are doing something that amuses you and that you wouldn’t want to be seen, it’s time to stop.” But this would not fully capture the matter if we didn’t also consider what is simultaneously conveyed.

This includes what presents itself as having all the characteristics of a fantasy. First, because the subject presents it as such, as a fantasy developed during his childhood, and second, because even if the fantasy was constructed in relation to another object, it is entirely clear that nothing embodies better than this fantasy the one he refers to when he says: “I thought of disguising my presence… as such, as the presence of seeing myself—the subject—in a room… very precisely by doing something that is obviously designed to attract attention, namely, barking.”

This has all the characteristics of a fantasy that most effectively fulfills the forms of the subject, insofar as it is adorned through the effect of the signifier. It pertains to the child’s use of what already presents itself as natural signifiers to serve as attributes for something that must be signified: the child who calls a dog “woof-woof.” Here, we are immersed in a phantasmatic activity: it is the subject himself who assigns the “woof-woof” to himself.

If, in essence, he signals his presence here, in fact, he signals it precisely within the fantasy—
this fantasy being entirely inapplicable—
through its very manifestation, through his very speech. He is supposed to make himself other than he is, even expelling himself from the domain of speech, becoming animal, rendering himself absent, literally naturalized.

It would not occur to anyone to verify that he is there because he has transformed himself, presented himself, and articulated himself through the most elementary signifier—not as “There is nothing here,” but literally as “There is nobody here.” This is truly and literally what the subject announces to us in his fantasy: insofar as I am in the presence of the other, I am nobody. This is the οὔτις (outis) of ULYSSES before the Cyclops. These are merely elements.

But as we proceed further into the analysis, we will see that it is precisely what the subject has associated with his dream that will allow us to understand how things are presented. Namely, in what sense and how is he “nobody”?

This does not occur without correlatives on the side of the other—specifically, the one to be warned—who, in this instance, happens to be, as in the dream, a woman. This is certainly not incidental to the situation, this relationship with the woman as such.

What will allow us to articulate something about the “something” that the subject is not and cannot be, as you will see, is something that directs us toward the most fundamental—indeed, as we have said—of symbols regarding the subject’s identification. If the subject absolutely insists—as everything indicates—that his female partner masturbates, occupies herself, it is assuredly so that she does not occupy herself with him.

Why he does not want her to focus on him, and how he does not want it, is something that, due to the normal conclusion of the time allotted for this session, we cannot articulate today and must postpone until next time.